Bulletproof
by alloutassaulthorizon
Summary: WARNING: Not a branch off from the book. I could find nowhere else that this would fit. My first book, so it might have hiccups. Let me know if something doesn't make sense. James Fling is taken prisoner by the mysterious NME. He is one of many with special abilities, but he has nearly no knowledge of his past. Upon escape he is forced to fight an enemy he does not understand.
1. Chapter 1

James Fling

Dementia

March 28th, 2026, late evening

I woke up in chains, in a cold, dark room, with a horrible headache. I tried to remember what happened, but it was all fuzzy. I remember the door crashing in, and gunshots, but nothing else. I checked to make sure everything was working. My arms were. So were my legs. I could open my mouth. But my left eye. I couldn't see out my left eye. Then I heard footsteps, coming in my direction.

"This is the one you were looking for, sir."

"It better be the right one this time."

A chill went down my spine. I felt like I should know who that was. In the dim light, I could make out the silhouettes of the two men. One of them pressed their hand to the wall, and the lights came on. They were blindingly bright. It wore off after a minute. There were steel bars in front of me; the men were behind them, and concrete walls on either side. I was in a prison cell.

"Well, I'll be," one of them says. "But I'll need a bit more proof than that."

I yanked at the chains, but they were welded to the walls.

"Who are you and what do you want from me?" I demanded.

"You don't remember me?" one said sarcastically. "Does NME ring a bell?"

Actually, it did, but I didn't say anything. I really didn't like that guy. There was some part of me wanting to yell, "as soon as I get out of here…", but I held back on it. I still didn't know who this guy was. I yanked at the chains some more.

"What in hell did you do to me?" I screamed. "I don't remember anything. Let me out of here!"

He gave a low chuckle, and then turned to the other guy.

"Yeah, that's him alright. Good job."

He turned to leave.

"I don't understand," I blurted out.

He turned back to me. "You will soon. Shoot him._ Once._"

"Alright," I yelled, "As soon I get out of here, your both dead!"

He laughed again, and told me, "Given your situation right now, I'd suggest you cooperate. Before I change my mind and actually do kill you."

The other man, who looked like some sort of soldier, with a completely grey outfit, that looked bulletproof, and had many pockets with pistols' handles sticking out, and a machine gun strapped to his back. He took one out, checked to make sure it was loaded, and took aim right at my forehead. I could feel the target light on my brow, and felt a tingling on my face. Then, he pulled the trigger. I felt a burning, that I was sure was the bullet, but it wasn't. I heard the bullet drop to the floor with an echoing ping sound. He sheathed the pistol, turned out the light, and left. And I sat there in the dark, mystified.

I had no idea where I was, but I knew I had been better places. I had been here for what had to have been hours, but I couldn't tell. My eyes were finally adjusted to the low light that was bouncing around the hallway, outside my cell. There wasn't much to see, though; steel bars, both in front of me and in the window behind me, the concrete bricks, and the chains that held me in this very uncomfortable kneeling position. The whole place looked dead. I couldn't see outside of my cell, but I figured it looked all the same.

So I tried to remember that big empty spot in my life, from when I was about nineteen to now. I tried to answer those questions buzzing around in my mind. I was bulletproof. Could I do anything else? I'll bet I have some rich alter ego. I probably have a big house. I hope I have a cool car, too. Is anyone worrying about me? I'll bet I have a girlfriend, at least. I probably have a bunch of rich friends that hang out at casinos and stuff. It went on like that, for I don't know how long.

After a while, I heard someone walking in my direction. No, they were running. And it wasn't just one person. There were lots of people. One came thundering through, and I mean thundering. He was going at least twenty-five miles per hour. He was carrying a sack with him, and everything was spilling out a hole in the bottom. And then a bunch of guys who looked just like the man who shot me a few hours ago came by in a golf cart, but weren't going half as fast. They were shouting something I didn't understand, and a few of them had guns aimed at the one they were chasing, but nobody was shooting.

Anyway, some of the stuff in the sack somehow got into my cell. There were two apples, an orange, and a plum. I was sure they were all bruised, but I was starving. The chains made it difficult but I grabbed the nearest one, an apple. I ate it, down to the core, but it only made me hungrier. I hadn't eaten in at least a day. So I picked up the plum and ate that, too.

I was about to start eating the second apple, but I heard something moaning from what I thought was the cell across from me. There was light coming in from the window, so I could see a little better, but it wasn't shining on anyone directly even though it was shining into the other cell.

I listened for a minute, and now it sounded more like a weeping. The sun had moved a little more, and I could see someone curled up in the corner of the cell across the hall. She was not in chains like me. I looked at the apple, then back at her. I could tell whoever it was, they were hungry. I thought, if I never get my memory back, wouldn't it be great to start fresh, with a good reputation? So I rolled the apple across the hall and somehow it found its way between the bars. I rolled the orange to, but it just hit the bar.

Whoever it was crept up to the apple, and I could see their face. It looked like a woman, about my age it looked like. Her clothes were all torn up, and looked like they were rotting. She quickly grabbed the apple, and scurried back into her corner. She ate the apple, core and all. She crawled up to the bars, looked both ways, and grabbed the orange. She looked like she was about to eat it, but put it in the corner and sat next to it. I was expecting a thank you, and praise, but I got, "You shouldn't have done that."

I didn't get it. "Why?" I asked. "I was trying to help."

"They'll only feed you as long as they need you," she said. "You're here because they want you with them." She checked to make sure nobody was looking again. "If they ask you to join them, say no, no matter how much they offer. Whatever they give you, it won't make up for what they'll have you doing. But they'll stop feeding you, and torture you until you say yes. If they don't need you anymore, they'll kill you."

"So how did you get in here?" I asked.

"Well, I'm a therapist," she said. "And when I needed to be, I was good with a gun too. And they have people watching you. Everywhere. They bug houses, they take security cameras' memory, and they use that to find everyone they want. And it's not just regular people. They take special people. Like us. They call us the Gifted. You, you're the one they've been looking for, at least three years now. You're bulletproof. I wish I was bulletproof." She pointed to a wound in her arm, and on the back of her leg. "I'm a telepath," she said. She didn't move her mouth, but I heard it as clear as can be, even with her English accent. "My name is Emily Ruston. I can read thoughts, and communicate my thoughts too. I can dig out the things you've forgotten, but I can't tell what it is unless you are thinking about it."

"James Fling," I told her. "Nice to meet you." So eventually, we came to an agreement. If she would help me get my memory back, I would give her half, or anything I could get to her if it was less than half of the food they gave me. And that was how I became friends with Emily Ruston.


	2. Chapter 2

Emily Ruston

Life as I know it

March 28th, 2026, early morning

That day I woke up, the same way I woke up every day. Hoping I'd been dreaming the last six years. But I wasn't. I was stuck in a cell, all night, all day, being tortured, starved, and bribed into joining the NME. Nothing new. Just a few guards passing by.

"The new guys are coming in tonight," one says.

"I heard that the one the boss has been looking for is coming today," says another.

"Wait, 'The One'?" says the third. "The bulletproof one? We've finally caught him? With him out of the way, we'll be done with them all in no time. And with all them out of the way, well, we could take the world."

I still didn't know what they were after; I didn't even know where I was. I could read their minds, and they always thought of home. I'd seen some from Russia, I'd seen some from America, I'd seen some from Alaska, and some from Sahara. They'd come from anywhere. So I never really found out where I was.

But the biggest thing on their minds was "The One". He was especially thought about by the really high ranking people. There were tons of rumors about him: that he'd wall jump, like they do in videogames, that he'd melt through stuff, and the most common, that he was bulletproof. I didn't believe all that other stuff. I didn't even believe he existed, until they said he was captured. There is always some truth in something. And you don't lie in your thoughts.

So that evening, a new guy moved in. He was chained to the walls, and had his memory knocked out by something they gave him. They knocked out most of my memory too, but nobody knew I was a telepath. I've been able to do that for way longer than they think, so when they knocked out most of my memory, they didn't give me enough of whatever that was to make me forget that.

I didn't care about him though; I was trying to get out like all the others that didn't forget everything. I'd been here for three years, and I knew it was survival of the fittest. It was his problem if he starved. His fault, not mine. But when Nate Miller came out, it was a whole different story. Nate would never come out of his little office. He'd never leave; he spent every second plotting with his group of terrorists. That guy across from me, that was "The One". The hole melting, wall-jumping, bulletproof one. That had to be him.

After they brought "The One" in, and they were done talking to him, I went to sleep. I woke up a few hours later, and I heard a motor running to my right. And there was my friend, making a break for it, at 25 miles an hour. And then there was a golf cart full of guys. They weren't shooting.

"If he's not a part of us yet, then he's fair game," they were thinking. But there was the voice of Nate in their heads. They went by pretty fast, and I couldn't tell what Nate had told them, although all of them seemed to be thinking about it.

But my friend spilled food from a sack. Most of it rolled into "The One's" cell. I was hungry. I'd had water from a leaky pipe on the ceiling, but I hadn't eaten in weeks. So I started fake-crying, to test him. He was my ticket out of here. I had to help him. And he gave me the food. I was a success. It worked every time. I was happy to get the food, but there was obviously work to be done there. I ate it anyway. I hadn't eaten in a few four or five weeks. I know I'm not supposed to eat the core, but I was starving. I was about to eat the orange, but then I started to feel guilty. I could have at the very least said thank you. But I needed to be constructive. This was "The One". He couldn't go around sympathizing for every poor helpless person around. But I didn't want him to leave me here.

"You shouldn't have done that," I told him.

He didn't seem to get it. "Why? I was trying to help," he said. That was reassuring. If he ever had the sense to break out of here, then it sounded like he'd take me with him. But he needed to know what was going on.

"They'll only feed you as long as they need you," I said. "If they ask you to join them, say no, no matter how much they offer. Whatever they give you, it won't make up for what they'll have you doing. But they'll stop feeding you, and torture you until you say yes. If they don't need you anymore, they'll kill you."

He still looked puzzled. He didn't get it. He was in chains, in a cell, where you couldn't go five minutes without seeing a guard. He didn't even remember who he was. It looked like he gave in. But he was "The One". He was the big guy; he was the head of all of us. And he didn't know who he was. He was bulletproof. And all that time after he was shot, he sat there, with a look on his face like "hey, that was cool". I was about to start yelling at him about it, but I stopped myself. It is better for him to figure it out on his own. And he changed the subject.

"So how did you get in here?" he asked.

Normally, I would be a little more skeptical of trusting someone I didn't know with stuff like that, but this guy was my ticket out of here. I didn't have time for that kind of thing. I had to be amiable, and a bit more trusting. I wouldn't want this guy to just go, "thanks for the help" and leave me here.

"Well," I said, "I'm a therapist. And when I needed to be, I was good with a gun too. And they have people watching you. Everywhere. They bug houses, they take security cameras' memory, and they use that to find everyone they want. And it's not just regular people. They take special people. Like us. They call us the Gifted. You, you're the one they've been looking for, at least three years now. You're bulletproof. I wish I was bulletproof."

I showed him the two places where I was shot. They still hurt. I'd had one since I got here; they'd shot me in the back of the leg and took me here. The other was from a few weeks ago. That last one was a threat. They told me this was my last chance. They were giving me until the end of March to join them. Miller had delivered that message.

"Mrs. Ruston, we are beginning to question if we need you," he said, and he shot me square in the arm.

I hesitated, but it seemed important. I thought about it, and looked down the hall. When I broadcast something, it's like a voice. I didn't have the energy I needed to concentrate it on one person. I had no idea what Miller would do to me if he found out. I took a deep breath.

"I'm a telepath," I communicated to him. "My name is Emily Ruston. I can read thoughts, and communicate my own."

"James Fling," he told me. "Nice to meet you."

That was very reassuring. I was on the right track. So we talked some more, and eventually we agreed that I would help him get his memory back everything he could get to me or just half. If he got something like soup and mashed potatoes, he could keep it. I had a good feeling about this guy.

That evening, after the guard came to give James food, we started the sessions. He gave me a mango and a banana, which somehow he managed to get between the bars. I ate the mango, but put the banana next to the orange.

"Alright," I told James. "I need you to just think about what happened."

"Well," he said, "I remember the door crashing in."

"Okay, what else? Anything specific about who or when?"

"It was at night. Pretty late. I was watching television. And the door crashed in. There were a bunch of guys shooting at me."

"Good, anything else? What did the guys shooting at you look like?"

"I don't remember what they looked like."

"Hold on a second," I told him. I was going to try and unblock that part. I could do that as a telepath. It wasn't easy, but I'd figured it out. I closed my eyes, focused in on his mind, and I could see things. It was what he was thinking about. It was a maze in there, with so many other things going on in his mind, but I found what was blocking some information. I focused, and moved whatever it was out. Memories are never forgotten, only buried.

"I remember now," he told me. That means I did it. "They looked like soldiers, in grey outfits, with some kind of futuristic looking gun. One of them had a Taser, though."

"Well, that was definitely these guys," I said. Antonio Stephens, their scientist, is always doing something in his lab, and more often than not, its weapons. He'll only come out every once in a while, but he is an easy mind to read.

"I was bulletproof," he said, "but it didn't help against a Taser. It came out of nowhere. And, actually, I wasn't getting shot at with bullets. It was something else. I don't even think it wasn't even metal. I think it might have been some kind of liquid. It was really hot, and it hurt pretty badly. I'm lucky it didn't kill me."

"What happened after that?"

"They took me here, I think. I'm still not sure. I was knocked out. But when I woke up again, I was here, with no memory of what happened."

"Alright, I think I know it from there. But I'd…"

I stopped talking. I heard footsteps of the guards. So that definitely wasn't good. Maybe they were coming to kill me early. Or, maybe, Nate wanted to see James. Or worse, maybe he wanted to kill James. That would mean more torturing for me. But they just walked by.

"The anti-Transoilium should get here tomorrow," one said.

"Tomorrow?" the other one yelled, "Nate would kill us if it got here that late. We need it here by this evening."

"But Admiral Nero," said the other, "An escort is standard procedure. NME policy. You know that."

"We don't have the time," said the Admiral. "We need it here by tonight. No later."

I looked to make sure they were gone. I quietly telecommunicated with James. "Do you know what that stuff is?" I asked.

He got a shocked look on his face. "Transoilium! That's what lets me melt through stuff. They're going to make it so I can't bust out of here!"


	3. Chapter 3

James Fling

Jailbreak

March 29th, 2026, about noon

"Hurry up; can we make this go any faster?" I called.

"Well, there is another way," she told me. She had a sort regretful, desperate look on her face. "I can surge your memory, and you will temporarily remember everything. But I'll fall asleep for a few hours, and I'll be stuck here."

"I'll bring you out of here. Just do it!"

"Alright, but I'm counting on you."

A few moments later, it all came back to me. I was bulletproof. I could stick to the walls. Heck, I could melt through walls. So I grabbed the chains, and concentrated. My hands turned black, those chains turned red, and started melting off. I was free. I felt very stiff, and my knees felt funny from being on the concrete floor for two days. I grabbed the bars of my cell. I tried to melt through that, but it was slow work.

I found a bone from the soup they gave me last night and picked the lock. I turned to Emily's cell and picked that lock. Then I saw the security camera. It was pointed right at me, but I didn't stop. I burst inside, slung her over my shoulder, and made a break for it.

I had no idea where I was going, actually. In fact, I ran straight into a guard. He fell over, shrieked, and scooted back. Then, he made a not so smooth grab for one of his pistols. I kicked his right arm, and that pistol went skidding somewhere else. I wanted to go get it, but I didn't have time.

I ran past a few more guards, who started shooting at me. Alarms were blaring. Gunshots were ringing. I looked back, and saw an elevator. I pressed the button. In a few seconds the doors opened. I was about to run in, but there were guards in there to, this time with strange, white, futuristic guns.

"No thanks, I'll take the next one," I said, and I ran down the hallway to the left. I found the stairs. I bolted down those, and past a window. We were on ground level. So I stopped, after hearing the footsteps coming down the stairs. I dove under the stairs. They ran straight over me, and down the hall. Cautiously, I got up. I eyed the window, and ran straight at it. I jumped through, with Emily still over my shoulders.

I was exhausted. But I kept going. I passed even more guards, all with white futuristic looking guns. They were all shooting at me. They had better aim than I though. I was hit a few times, and I could see that Emily's rotting clothes were burned in some places. Strangely enough, these shots hurt.

I ran to the wall, in the blind spot of the extraordinarily high towers. I put Emily down, pressed my hands to the wall, and concentrated. This was even slower than the bars. So I took of my shoes and socks, picked up Emily, and started climbing up the wall.

I had to run; the guards in the tower had obviously spotted me, and were shooting at me with bullets. Lucky me. Not so lucky Emily. She was taking a beating. I think she got a third shot, this time in the foot. I'd almost cleared the wall. They were still shooting at me, but they kept missing. The guard towers, though, had upgraded to the futuristic guns, and had much better aim. I was on top of the wall. They were still shooting at me. I hurried over to one of the guards shooting at me, grabbed his gun, and knocked him off the wall, which was only about three feet wide. I started picking off the guards in one of the towers, which were really wooden platforms with walls. As soon as I won that one, I could put Emily down, who was a bit heavier than I'd imagine for someone who has been starved in prison for three years.

About eight guards to go. One takes a shot to the head, who staggers back and falls over the edge. Seven. I ran up to the tower, and wacked a guy unconscious with the barrel of my gun. Six. I just shoved one off the edge. Five. One came at me, but I simply threw him into another guy, and they both fell. Three. I tried to shoot the rest, but it was out of ammo. I wacked one guy with it, and took his gun. Then I shot him off the edge. Two. I shot each of them with a small burst, and they're knocked out too.

I'd taken that tower. I put Emily down and examined her. She was bleeding in a number of places, I confirmed that she got shot in the foot, and I also think that she still had some glass in her back from when I jumped out the window. It was pretty chilly up here too. We were in a tower, and there wasn't much that I could do for her.

There were still guys shooting at me, and I figured she'd wake up soon, so I left. I still had my gun, and so I started picking off guys in the next tower. This was kind of fun, actually. It was like one of those videogames I'd played with my roommate in college. Except way more real. And it hurt a little more when you got shot. It wasn't enough to kill me, but it wasn't something I could just pretend wasn't there.

I'd almost cleared out the tower, but over all the gunfire, all the screaming, I heard wood creaking. I turned back. There was someone else in the tower I left Emily in. I made a mad dash (well, as fast as I could without being too careless; the wall was only three feet wide) for Emily's platform. The man there looked like the others, but he had much more elaborate designs on his vest. It read "Millers Assistant". That wasn't good. He was almost seven feet tall, and when I shot at him, he just scratched it like it was nothing.

That wasn't the worst of it, either. Miller sent helicopters after me to. He had two Apaches and one Hind out there, but, and he didn't know this, I was immune to the shrapnel from explosives too. So I focused on "Millers Assistant".

I'd have to get close up. That was going to be hard. I really wish that I was like superman, and didn't feel anything, but no, just bullets and explosives. Anything else hurt just as bad.

I noticed something else that only he had. A grenade. If I could activate that, and somehow, get us out of here before the whole wall came down, we'd be on our way.

So I shot him a few times just to get his attention. "Millers Assistant" turned around, and yelled at me in some foreign language. He must have known I was bulletproof, because instead of taking something from the wide array of guns from his pocket, he came at me. He swung his fist at me, and nailed me in the cheek. I fell over, and he turned his attention back to Emily. I couldn't see much; I probably had a black eye, the good one, and the other one wasn't working for some reason. I crawled over to "Millers Assistant", used his legs to pull myself up, and tried to activate the grenade. He realized what I was doing, so he took my arm, twisted it, and threw me back on the ground. Wonderful. Now I had a black eye, and a not working eye, so I couldn't see, and what felt like a broken left arm. I thought about the helicopters then. They were shooting at me, but not at Emily. And those pilots were shooting at me with their guns, probably because they didn't want to hit "Millers Assistant". Maybe I could get one of them. They were all hovering about ten feet from the wall. I needed the one that was best armed. The Hind had only a few rockets. Both of the Apaches were fully armed. I chose the nearest Apache. I got up and shoved "Miller's Assistant" away, picked up Emily, slung her over my shoulder, and jumped at the helicopter.


	4. Chapter 4

Emily Ruston

Over and out

March 29th, 2026, Evening

I woke up, a few hundred feet above the ground, with a throbbing pain in my foot, and a burning pain almost everywhere else, over someone's shoulder, who was hanging from the machine gun on a helicopter by one hand. It had to be James. He was trying to get onto the landing gear, and climb up. The helicopter was trying to shake him off. We were right under the intake part of the engine.

"Is there any way I can help?" I asked, looking for a good foothold.

"Yeah," he said, "I think I broke my arm, and I'm not sure I can climb this thing. Could you get up there and pull me up?"

"I'll try," I said.

It wasn't going to be easy, though. I would have to get far enough in front that I wouldn't get sucked into the engines, and low enough that I wouldn't get hit by the blades. So I climbed around the front, and up on top of the cockpit. I grabbed James's good arm and pulled him up.

"So now what?" I asked

"Hold on a second," he told me.

He pressed his hand to the glass, and looked like he was concentrated. I still don't believe the next thing I saw actually happened. That glass turned orange, and melted away. It actually melted. The rumors were true.

He pulled out the pilot, snatched the helmet, and threw him from the helicopter. He screamed, and yelled, and a few seconds later, hit the ground. The gunner surrendered the helmet, opened the side door, and jumped out with his parachute.

"Climb in," he told me. I sat in the gunners chair and put on the helmet.

"Do you know how to fly this thing?" I called.

"No, I don't, but I'll figure it out," he said.

I sure hoped he would. So I tried to focus on my part. I knew that the gun pointed whatever way I looked when I had the helmet on. It couldn't be that hard. Wait… where is the trigger? How do I fire the rockets? I didn't even know how to lock on targets. What does this switch do? What is this dial for? I had no idea how to do anything. James wasn't making it any easier; pitching and rolling, trying to figure out how to work this thing.

I heard someone over the radio, saying, "They have taken one of the helicopters! Saber 3 0 is now a hostile! Raptor 1 0 and Trident 6, knock them out!"

Then I heard a much more serious voice, saying, "I want them shot down with minor damage! Take them alive. I want them alive! Do you know how much work it took to get that helicopter? Those things aren't cheap, even when you own the industry! I want minor damage to the engines or tail rotor only!"

It had to be Miller. My hands fumbled around with the controls, pressing this button, still not knowing what would happen. I finally found a little stick with a trigger on it that fired the guns. It was much easier after that.

I was knocking out guys on the ground when I James turned violently to the side, and an object hurtled past us leaving a trail of white smoke. Then a few more flew past. I thought he was yelling something at me. We swung around and I saw it. A very funny looking helicopter was shooting at us. He yelling got louder, but I couldn't understand him over the blades. So I tried to read his mind. Although it was hard to concentrate, I could tell he was in panic. I think he wanted me to shoot at it. So I did.

We were a pretty good team, considering we didn't know what we were doing. He'd dodge all the rockets, well, most of them, and I'd hit it here and there. The intake engine on the right of the funny looking helicopter was smoking, and it was slowly getting lower. I kept shooting at it.

All of a sudden, the helicopter took a violent jerk to the left.

"They hit us!" yelled James, but it was barely audible over the blades, struggling to keep us from plummeting down a few hundred feet. I'm sure I heard him call "Rockets!" but I still didn't know how to do that.

He swung us around, so I was facing a helicopter that looked just like ours. It was firing at us with some sort of rocket. I used the machine guns, but it kept dodging. I'd hit it now and then, but it didn't seem to be working. Then I got an idea.

"James, get me up close!" I called up to him. I was going to try to read the other gunner's mind to figure out how to work this thing.

He must have heard me; he pulled up right above the helicopter and put us in a steady hover. I was in the perfect position to fire the machine guns, but I needed them to stay where they were.

The gunner's mind was panicked, and it took some concentration, which was hard with the blades roaring overhead. But I figured it out. There were buttons on the side of the stick that fired the guns. They controlled the guided and unguided rockets. I shot them with the guns, just to get them in a good position for me to fire the rockets. They pulled out from under us, and fired on us with their guns.

I was sure that James was struggling with the controls, and we couldn't stay up here much longer. Finally, we got the perfect chance. I held down on that button with the unguided rockets, and behind all that smoke there was a bright orange. And a few seconds later I heard all the debris of the enemy helicopter hit the ground.

The helicopters were gone. We were safe. Now, where do we go? They're bound to send someone after us, and we don't know where we are. At least we were on the other side of that wall. I took the helmet off, put it in my lap, and just sat there half relieved, half expecting something else would happen. But we got out alive, and were free.

We had to be going at least a hundred miles per hour. And although we had been traveling for at least five hours, we hadn't come across any civilization. Just desert. Something else didn't feel right. It felt like I should be able to see more than what I was seeing, but maybe it was that it was night. What bothered me was that the angle didn't feel right. It felt like we were falling.

"James," I called, "Do you think we could get a little higher than this? I think we're too low."

"I'm on full power," he told me.

"But we're dropping."

"We are?"

"Yes. I'm not sure to we can stay up here much longer."

"Alright then, I'll try to land."

James put us in a steady hover. I was impressed by how quickly he learned to control this thing. He gently put us on the ground, and stopped the blades. We got out, stepped into the sand, and started walking. Well, limping.

It was a heck of a ride; I was banged around in that helicopter a lot. And I was shot in the foot. James had to hold up and wait for me every twenty yards. He needed me to see though. I could tell he had a black eye, and he told me something was wrong with the other one.

We were walking for what felt like hours, and may very well have been, but our helicopter was still visible. The stars and the quarter moon lit the sky, so we could still see, but the helicopter was only a few miles away.

"Do you know where we're going?" I asked.

"No idea," he answered. "But wherever we go, it can't be worse than that prison cell."

There was a long pause.

"So what was your life like before you came here?" I asked.

"Pretty stressful. These guys are out to get me," answered James. "They'll do whatever it takes to kill me. Stay in one place too long, and there goes the neighborhood."

"You must have been lots of places."

"Yeah, I guess. But it hasn't really paid off yet. I'm stuck hiding in apartment buildings. Living in the slums doesn't really count as seeing the world."

"It must be hard moving around like that all the time."

"Maybe that explains why that coward Miller sends his minions after me all the time instead of coming after me himself."

I figured out that he was trying to be funny, and managed a slight smile. I'm not sure he could tell though.

"Should we go back?" I asked. "We made better time than this in the helicopter. Maybe we can fix it."

"I don't know what's wrong with that thing," he told me. "I guess we could try, though."

So we started back to the helicopter, only about two miles away. It was quiet, and cold, and dark. When we were about half way there, I collapsed. My foot was killing me. I was freezing. I just couldn't make it.

When James noticed me, he said, "We'll make camp here for tonight. You can sleep. I'll keep watch."

I didn't say anything; I lay down in the cold sand, and fell asleep.

* * *

Okay guys thanks for keeping with me up to this point. I plan on releasing about two chapters a week, at least up until the end of Part 1. Writing's the fun part, and I got that down, but editing... Although being critical of myself is one of my personal strengths, it's not easy. If you see something that doesn't make sense, please let me know so I can fix it. Thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

James Fling

Hot pursuit

March 30th, 2026, around 6:00 A.M.

I was freezing. If it was any more comfortable, I would be asleep. I'd been up for two nights straight, no sleep whatsoever. I'd planned on going to sleep a few hours ago. Of course, we were still in the helicopter then. I didn't know what to do.

The sand and wind were blowing around in my face, and my throat was dry from not having anything to drink in about a day and a half. A human can only survive two days without water. And if I didn't get my dose of Transoilium, then I would not be bulletproof. And Transoilium won't do me any good if I'm dehydrated.

The sun was beginning to rise on the horizon to the east. Emily was still asleep. Her foot was not bleeding too badly anymore, but it wasn't looking too good either.

So I tried to fall asleep. I needed to rest. Miller wouldn't just give up like that. He had me contained, with no idea of who I was, and I got away anyway. That must be the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to him. Well, there were a bazillion times I did something like that, but this had to have been the worst.

I was half asleep, and I was snapped into consciousness by the roaring of tanks and the shaking ground. I got up and took a look. There was an army of Miller's soldiers, sprinting across the desert, guns at the ready. I got back down, hoping that they hadn't seen me, but I knew it was too late. I crawled over to Emily.

"Wake up, wake up," I told her.

I shook her harder.

"Wake up! Wake up!"

But it was no use. I would have to carry her. Again. So I picked her up and started running.

I wondered what else Miller sent after me. I sure hoped it wasn't his assistant. That would almost be worse than more helicopters. Or jet. I absolutely hate jets. If one of those things shot me, no matter how much Transoilium I had, no matter how hydrated I was, it would kill me. Transoilium can't take anything with the velocity of jet fire.

So I sprinted across the cold, dry wasteland. Getting shot at here and there, and actually feeling it wasn't really helping. The sand was all up in my face, and my eyes were watering up. The cold was nipping at my legs and arms. I knew I was going to have to fight them. But I kept on running.

I looked back. The NME soldiers were about a hundred yards away, and gaining. I was looking out to the horizon, hoping that there was a city or something where I could put Emily down and find somewhere to hide. But I saw nothing. And not focusing on what was in front of me; I tripped over one of the lumps of sand. I probably could have recovered if I wasn't carrying Emily, but the extra weight brought me down. We tumbled across the sand.

They were right on top of me before I could get back up. They made me put down Emily, and put my hands on my head. Then they walked me over to a big armored truck, and threw me in the back. But they left Emily there; still asleep.

I was in a big metal box, with metal grating in the front. I knew I was almost dehydrated, and I had almost no Transoilium, but I summoned up all I had left to melt through the grating and get into the cab.

There were men laughing and smiling and high fiving each other. And then they saw me. The laughing and talking and smiling instantly stopped. Two of the twelve guys started shooting at me. The others were too frightened. I had about twenty seconds before I was completely out of Transoilium. So I kicked one of the guys shooting at me. He dropped his gun and I picked it up. I held it ready to shoot, pointing it at one soldier and then the next.

"Get out!" I shouted.

The driver stopped the big truck and everyone scurried out. They put down their guns and backed away from the truck slowly, and when they thought I wasn't looking, they ran for it.

So I got into the driver's seat and came back around to go pick up Emily. She had woken up and was walking around. She saw me in front, and limped up to the door. She got in, and collapsed in the passenger seat.

I sped off, not knowing where I was going. For all I knew, I could be heading straight back to Miller. I heard a few gunshots in the back. They were making the engine sound funny. The humming turned into a grinding.

"Emily, go take a look behind us," I said.

"They're after us," she said, looking out the side view mirror.

"Well throw them some lead," I said. "There are a few guns in the back."

She found a sniper rifle and opened one of the windows on the left side of the truck.

"I can't get a good angle on them," she told me. "I need you to turn to your left a little."

I made a slight left turn, but I kept driving top speed, and Emily was shooting at the guys following us, but it didn't seem to be helping.

"I don't hear anything blowing up," I said.

"Yeah, we're in a truck full of explosives. Maybe nothing blowing up is a good thing," she called back.

I could tell that the back of the truck wouldn't hold up to the gunfire much longer. I heard metal creaking and the shells raining on us from behind.

"This would be a good time to make sure you're looking through the right end of the scope," I joked.

"No, this would be a good time to you make sure your foot is on the right pedal," she snapped back. "That must be the fiftieth one I've hit, but they're not stopping."

So I decided to let Emily be and focus on driving. The patter of bullets on the back of the truck was very worrying.

"Wait, they're turning around," called Emily. "Why are they turning around?"

"Maybe you can shoot after all," I said, smiling. "Just accept it and don't question it. If they leave, it means clean sailing for us."

"They had to have been planning something," she said. "If they didn't have reason to turn around, they wouldn't have. We were right under their noses."

"Oh, well that must be it," I said. "They're low on fuel."

"How do you know?" asked Emily.

"Because we are too," I answered.

"How much longer can we make it?"

I looked at the fuel gauge. The yellow light was on. I looked at the mpg gauge. The hand was pointing on the 15.

Really? 15 mpg? How on earth did they get all the way out here? This is as smooth as sailing gets! Well, at least in the desert with no paved roads, but even so.

"Probably about an hour," I told Emily.

"Well I'll tell you what," she said. "I'll drive. You can sleep. It's been a long day for you."

"You sure?" I asked.

"Are you kidding? You saved me twice. I owe you a few."

I wasn't going to argue with that. So I slid over into shotgun and closed my eyes.

I woke up in a room, not like a cell, but a fancy hotel room. I was in a bed, and Emily was sitting at a desk on the other side of the room. I sat up straight and looked around.

"Where are we?"

Emily turned around.

"Oh, you're awake."

I tried to straighten myself, but my left arm felt limp. It hurt very badly when I moved it.

"Go easy on your left arm," she said. "It looked banged up pretty bad. I'm trying to find you a doctor."

"I thought we'd run out of fuel," I said.

"We did," she told me. "And the truck kind of blew up while I was trying to fix it."

"What did you do?" I asked.

"Long story," she replied.

"There are no long stories," I said. "Only short ones that you don't want to tell."

"Well," she said, "let's just say that gunpowder doesn't work as well on an engine as gasoline."

"I'm never letting you drive my truck again," I said.

"Anyway my friend found us and rented us a room," she said, changing the subject. "Funny. Miller took him too, and he escaped at about the same time as us. He's like us. He can run unbelievably fast. I think you two will get along fine."

"I don't plan on staying," I said, sternly. "Remember when I said, 'stay in one place too long, and there goes the neighborhood'? Well I wasn't joking. In fact I was being literal. Right now, Miller knows exactly where we are. He'll come in with bombers, and light the place up like New Years."

"I know," she said. She limped over to the window, and pulled back the curtains. "That's our way out," she said, pointing at an airport a few miles away.


	6. Chapter 6

Emily Ruston

Old friends

March 31st, 2021, mid afternoon

We were safe. We were momentarily safe. All thanks to my friend two rooms down, Peter Stone. He found me, in the middle of nowhere, sitting next to a pile of shrapnel that used to be our truck, and took me in.

James was at his doctor's appointment, so I decided to go visit him, to say thanks and talk. I walked down the hallway and to the room my friend stays in. I lightly knocked on the door. It opened almost immediately.

"Hello, Emily," called my friend. "Would you like to come in?"

"Thank you Peter," I said, and I stepped inside.

He took me to a well-furnished living room and gestured to me to sit on the couch. We had a very nice view of the golf course out the window.

"So what's on your mind?" he asked me.

"I just came to say thanks," I said.

"What for?" he asked me.

"Well you know, finding me and James, and renting us a room and all."

"Hey, what are friends for? I'd do it again in an instant."

"So how did you get out?" I asked, changing the subject.

"You know me," he said. "As soon as they opened the doors, I made a break for it. What about you? How did you get out?"

"Well, I don't know it in as much detail as I would like, but I'll try my best. Remember the guy you found with me? Well he got me out. I remember we stole a helicopter and left. Then we had to land, in the middle of nowhere. So when I woke up the next morning, we were running from a bunch of Miller's troops in a big truck. They turned around, and we ran out of fuel. The truck kind of blew up while I was trying to get it to work again. Not all explosives work the same way as gasoline." I smiled, and he laughed. "And that's about the part where you found us," I concluded.

"Speaking of your friend, where is he?" asked Peter.

"Oh, he's at a doctor's appointment," I said. "He broke his arm, and can't see out his left eye."

"Hmm… I think I might be able to fix that. Tell me what the doctor says when he gets back."

"Okay then, I hope you know what you're doing."

"Well the important thing is we're all safe now," he said, smiling.

The smile disappeared from my face. "No, we're not safe," I told Peter. "The guy I escaped with. He is 'The One'. Remember how all the guards would talk about how bad Miller wanted 'The One'? Well it's no myth. This guy is the real deal."

"So I guess this means you guys aren't staying," Peter said, disappointed. "I'll come with you guys anyway."

"Thanks, we need all the help we can get."

"Where exactly are you guys going, then? England?"

"No, America. They have one of the strongest armies in the world. It's our best bet at stopping Miller."

So I got up, thanked him one more time, and left. I went back to our room and tried to figure out how to get plane tickets.

I didn't want to ask Peter for money, though. He'd already done too much for us. I didn't think I could get paid to shoot anything around here. I didn't think there were many fast food places that I could work at. So I decided to go back and try therapy again.

I never wanted to have anything to do with therapy again. It's torture, for me. The first time I did it, it was because I thought I'd be good at it, you know, as a telepath. I was right, but people would come to me with the weirdest things. And they'd expect me to cure it, whatever it was. There was one specific time that really crept me out.

I was sitting there, in my office, just playing solitaire while I waited for my next patient. The rain hit the window and gave the air that kind of thin feel. And one patient came in about two hours early.

"They're starting again!" she screamed.

I remembered her. She'd been having strange nightmares that wouldn't stop.

"You're early," I told her, and opened the door.

"They're happening again!" she whined.

"Calm down," I told her. "You're safe here."

"No, I don't think I am," she said. "This time, I dreamed that I will be killed at exactly five."

"Now, Mary," I said, "that was just a dream. I'm sure nothing is going to happen."

"Like the time when I dreamed I'd slip and fall in the kitchen?" she asked. "Like the time I dreamed I'd crash my car?"

"You're being ridiculous, Mary. Those were all coincidences."

But Mary didn't seem too sure. She was nervously glancing at the clock, which read 4:30.

"Mary," I said, "those all had simple explanations. When you slipped and fell, it was because you were wearing stockings on the marble floor, and when you crashed, you just weren't paying attention."

"But they happened just like I dreamed they would," she said.

"Ok, why don't you tell me about this dream," I said calmly. I picked up the notepad and a pencil.

"Alright," she said. "Well the way I remember it, I was in a room by a window."

She glanced at the clock again. 4:35. Then she continued. "I was talking to someone, although I don't remember who. I remember being in a comfortable little chair, and how it was raining outside."

I thought about that. It had been raining for days, so that was nothing new. And her talking to someone wasn't anything new either. She was a very amiable person, and last time she was here she gave me the names of too many of her friends to keep track of.

"The person I was talking to seemed very calm. I looked like I was enjoying the conversation. I turned to the clock, which read 5:00. I think I was leaving so I could come here. And as soon as I got in the car, I was shot."

"Ok, so is that why you came here early?" I asked.

"Yes," she answered. She looked back at the clock. 4:45, now. "Please don't make me leave," she pleaded. "I don't want to go home."

I hesitated. I was busy today. I had about three more patients to get to today, and it was pretty late. But this woman seemed desperate.

"Ok," I said, "you can stay. But I'll need you to sit in the waiting room. I'm very busy today."

Mary, very grateful, went to the waiting room immediately. So I went back to my game of solitaire. Ten minutes later, at 4:55, the next patient came in. It was Miles Thatcher, a man who was having trouble dealing with his harsh boss at work. We had just gotten settled in, when we heard glass shattering. We both rushed to the waiting room. Mary lay there, on the ground, covered in blood and glass. She had been shot. I looked at the clock. 5:00, exactly.

Miles knelt down next to her and put his hand on her wrist to check her pulse. I tried to read her mind. But there was nothing there. The blood had stopped going to her brain. She was dead.

Later I realized she was one of us. She was a clairvoyan, a future-teller. I now suspect the NME being behind that. All clairvoyans would have been a threat to them.

So back in real time, James came back. He said that it was just a bruise, and that nothing was broken, but I'm not wasn't listening. I was still thinking about Mary.

James noticed that I wasn't really paying him any attention.

"Ok, what's on your mind?" he asked.

So I told him the long sad story of Mary. He didn't say anything for a while, he just stood there. For a while he looked like he was thinking about something.

"Hold on," he told me. "You found someone like that once, right?"

"Yes, I did, but that was back in England," I replied.

"Well, I think you may have a shot here," he said. "And imagine how much help it would be to find one here. A future-teller. You can read thoughts. So can you see dreams?"

"I've never tried before," I said. But that wasn't true. I had seen people's dreams, but I never wanted to do that again either. It reminded me too much of Mary.

"Ok but try anyway," he told me. And he walked out of the room.

So I decided then, that that's what I was going to do. I was going to find us a clairvoyant.


	7. Chapter 7

James Fling

Future-teller

April 3rd, 2026, early morning

This therapy thing has gotten us nowhere as far as finding a clairvoyant. So far, just people with weird dreams. Emily can tell when it's a clairvoyant, as a telepath.

On the other hand, though, we'd raised enough money for one plane ticket. I see it as an accomplishment, but Emily says we have a ways to go.

So due to the fact that our hotel apartment thing is pretty small, I was confined to the bedroom. Emily says she can't work with me around. I'm like thanks, that makes me feel so appreciated. So it was about eight in the morning and we had our first patient today.

I don't know what happened, I tuned out as soon as the person started complaining. I clicked on the TV, but I didn't understand a word they were saying. They were talking in… well… foreign. Not English, that's all I needed to know. So I turned off the TV. After about twenty minutes, I was just about as bored as a guy could get.

I thought about what it was that Emily had helped me remember. Maybe if I tried hard enough, I could get it myself. And I asked myself the questions that I had from what I had remembered. Like I remembered I was pretty good at martial arts. Where did I learn that? I looked out the window because of a very distracting whirring noise. I pulled back the blinds.

An airport. I felt some connection. Had I learned to fly a plane? I thought of a cockpit. And it didn't show up as a commercial airliner cockpit. It looked more like that of a jet. There were little buttons on one of the flight sticks. Little red buttons. Like a fighter jet. Had I been in the air force? Maybe that explained how I was able to fly that helicopter. That would explain the martial arts too.

But what about that cool stuff I was able to do? I climbed a wall a few hundred feet high. I had melted my way through chains. And I was bulletproof. I had no explanation for that. I kept trying to remember. It was right on the tip of my tongue. It started with T. Trans… Trans something. Transoilium. That was it. Transoilium.

But there was something else. Like a friend. Kyle or something. No, not Kyle. Kevin. For some reason his last name eluded me and I kept thinking Guts. I remembered it was something really weird. Gutierrez. That was it. Kevin Gutierrez. He was a real good friend, I remember that. We had a lot of fun together. We were roommates in college. But he could get serious too. He would keep me from doing some stupid stuff. He was really persuasive. He kept me from running away a few times.

If I went to America, and I found him again, I was sure I could get him over here to help. I wondered how much he had changed in the years we had been apart.

His motto was famous among all the pilots-to-be. Shoot it if it moves, and shoot it if it doesn't. That would really help here.

I heard knocking on the door.

"You can come out now," Emily said.

"Ok, I'm coming," I said.

"And I have better news than that," she said cheerfully. "We've found a clairvoyant. Well, she found us, I guess."

So I went to see the new clairvoyant. She was Japanese, with a pale face, freckles, golden brown hair that went down to her cheeks, and deep, dark blue eyes.

"Hello," she said, smiling. "I Naomi Yamada." She held out her hand, and I shook it.

Obviously she didn't know English very well.

"I'm…"

"James Fling," she interrupted. "I know you."

"Oh. I'm sorry if I don't remember you; I've had about three years of my memory wiped."

"No, from a dream," said Naomi. "A dream told me come here. It said that there was two people that looked for me, you and Emily."

"Well we're glad you came," said Emily. "But it isn't a good idea to go to everyone that is looking for you."

"Yeah," I said. "It's a long story, but there are people who… um… don't want you around."

"What do you mean?" Naomi asked.

"Well," Emily started, "There are a bunch of people out there, are trying to kill other people. They are terrorists. And you, being a clairvoyant, can help stop them. So those people don't want clairvoyants around."

"Clairvoyants?" asked Naomi, puzzled.

"Future-tellers," I clarified. "Anyway, you are a clairvoyant. And there are people that don't want you around. But we are here to help you, and hopefully you can help us."

"But does not everyone see the future?" asked Naomi.

"No, not everyone can do that," I said. "You are special. It happens, like you said, in dreams."

"That helps make some sense," Naomi said. "My friends… family… they think I was crazy. But you think I am not crazy." She looked at us. "You think I am not crazy, do you?"

Emily and I looked at each other. "No," we said simultaneously.

"It would just be easier to understand you if you spoke better English," I said. I looked over to Emily who was nodding.

"Oh, I sorry," Naomi said in a more timid voice than before. "English is not my first language. I try, though."

Naomi turned to leave the room, but stopped. She turned back to us.

"Is it fine if I stay today, with you?" asked Naomi. "I have no room. I can sleep on the sofa."

"It's ok if you stay with us tonight," said Emily. "But you'll need to stay in the room with James. I am busy today."

Emily seemed to stutter at those words. She hung her head and left the room.


End file.
